NSA whistleblower revealed

The US government will be happy to learn it will save several million dollars on the criminal inquiry into the identity of the NSA's PRISM whistleblower because moments ago in a lengthy profile by the Guardian's Glenn Greenwald, said whistleblower has decided to reveal himself to the world: he is Edward Snowden, 29 years old. Originally from Elizabeth City, NC, a Maryland community college dropout and former Special Forces trainee, the 10 year "veteran" with the NSA, most recently in its Hawaii office under the employ of defense contractor Booz Allen Hamilton, has just made history and joined the pantheon of such legendary whistleblowers of the US government' secret activities as the Pentagon Papers' Daniel Ellsberg and Wikileaks' Bradley Manning. Last but not least, Edward is currently residing in Hong Kong, out of harm's (read America's) way.

"I realised that I was part of something that was doing far more harm than good... The NSA routinely lies in response to Congressional inquiries about scope of surveillance in America. The NSA is intent on making every conversation and every form of behaviour in the world known to them.... What they're doing" poses "an existential threat to democracy."

I don't understand what the big deal about the NSA snooping on us is all about really. The press is acting like this is some new revelation when it's been common knowledge that the government records all our phone calls and internet activity for well over a decade, ever since the Patriot Act became law. I remember like seven or eight years ago there was an episode of Frontline where they interviewed a former NSA guy who had worked in the spying program and he said could listen in on any private phone conversation he wanted or read any email. The press has known about this for quite a long time. Why get so up in arms about it now?